Submission

+ Submit Work

To submit to darkmatter, please email the Editors editor@darkmatter101.org. Submissions can be sent in a variety of formats (e.g. doc, rtf, html, odt, mp3, theora). If you have any queries or problems, email the Editors or use the Contact page.

darkmatter journal publishes regular Issues, with content usually under three different categories of submission: Articles; Commons; Reviews:

(i) Articles (3000-7000 words) are externally peer reviewed.

(ii) Commons (500-3000 words) is a forum for incisive interventions and polemics. Though subject to editorial review, Commons submissions are not subject to external peer review.

Please note that word counts above only apply to written texts. We welcome alternative types of content for Articles, Commons and Reviews submissions, including images, audio, video and multimedia content.

darkmatter content is either commissioned as part of Special Issues, or General Issues published on a rolling basis:

(a) Special Issues
Special Issues are collections of content on either a specific theme or an open-ended topic of research. An Issue can comprise of a series of Articles and/or Commons and Review pieces. We welcome guest editors for Special Issues. For further information, see the Issue Proposal page.

(b) General Issues
As an alternative to Special Issue collections, work suitable for Articles, Commons or Reviews sections may be submitted at any time to the journal and are published on a continuous ‘rolling’ basis in a particular General Issue.

+ Call for Papers

+ Peer and Editorial Review

Submission

Peer Review

Editorial Review

Articles

Commons

Reviews

Where a submission is considered for peer review in the Articles section, it is then read by at least one external reviewer, and a member of the darkmatter editorial team. On the basis of advice from reviewers, darkmatter editors make a decision on the submission: (i) Accept: publish; (ii) Accept: minor revisions; (iii) Re-submit: major revisions; (iv) Reject. All other submissions – Commons and Reviews - are read by at least one of the editors.

We are aware that the peer review process is not without its flaws, and we attempt to ensure that reviewers engage with submissions fairly and productively, with an emphasis on encouraging new and marginal voices and fresh critical perspectives. In the spirit of adopting an open peer review practice, reviewers’ feedback in future Issues will be published alongside the final version of the article, and we offer both reviewers and contributors the option to forego anonymity. Further details about the peer review process can be found on our wiki page. The journal editors make the final judgement as to publication, taking account of feedback from reviewers.

In the case of Issues, guest editors also adopt a reviewer role. For further information, see the Issue proposal page.

All items published in darkmatter will be indexed in open archive databases.

+ Editorial Procedure

darkmatter is run by the General Editors/Management Team. Each submission is read and internally reviewed by members of the editorial team. A team member is appointed as an article editor, and takes responsibility for communication with the contributor. (In the case of a Special Issue with a Guest Editor, see the Issue proposal page).

+ Timescales

Special Issues: contributors will be given an indication of the expected publication date in the Call for Papers information.

Articles: a submission published in the peer-review section of the journal usually takes four to six months from submission to publication.

Commons or Reviews: submissions usually takes four to eight weeks to publication, though topical interventions in Commons are normally published more quickly.

If a submission is not considered suitable for publication, contributors are informed normally within eight weeks.

+ Book Reviews

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University of East London
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Docklands Campus
London E16 2RD, UK

+ Copyright

Unless otherwise stated, all darkmatter Journal content is published under a Creative Commons (CC) license. Unlike many journals which retain copyright and distribution over your work, darkmatter operates on the principle of open access, encouraging the free distribution – ‘copyleft’ – of culture and knowledge. An author published in darkmatter retains copyright over their own work, and is free to republish elsewhere (in original or altered form). All we expect is to indicate original attribution to the Journal by citing – linking back to – the original article’s URL. Any work published under the creative commons license may be republished for non-commercial purposes by other third parties as long as attribution to darkmatter Journal is indicated.

+ Style Guide I: Inserting References/Endnotes

For citing bibliographic sources or references, the journal uses an endnoting method.
When writing a reference, in the main body of the article indicate where the endnote is to be located by using a number enclosed by curly brackets {{..}}
At the end of the article, wrap the endnote text twice with a set of square brackets with the corresponding number [[..]]endnote text here[[..]]
Some examples below:

Note the following:

Leave no space between the article text and {{..}} and put after punctuation.

Number each endnote in your text

Do not use automatic endnoting or footnoting in Microsoft Word or any other word processor